


Mission: #9

by Ignisentis



Series: 32 Ways To Say I Love You [9]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Blatant Misuse of a James Bond Quote, Idiots in Love, M/M, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, soft and sweet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-23
Updated: 2020-01-23
Packaged: 2021-02-27 13:40:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22368082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ignisentis/pseuds/Ignisentis
Summary: What happens when Steve goes on a mission without Bucky, Bucky goes on a mission without Steve, and they both go on a mission together? They're cute AF, predictably.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Series: 32 Ways To Say I Love You [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1602352
Comments: 35
Kudos: 210





	Mission: #9

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to part 9 of "32 Ways To Say I Love You," a series of fluffy ficlets wherein Steve and Bucky are happy, in love, and soft with each other. I'll be posting one a day from now until Valentine's Day, like the hopeless romantic I am.
> 
> Set in a magical time after Age of Ultron where everyone gets along, nothing hurts, and the Avengers live in the Tower. Because the world is a tire fire, and I think we all could use something nice.
> 
> This is also an attempt to get my writing mojo back, so if you have an idea you want to see here, hit me up on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/Ardeospina) and I'll see what I can do! Or just come yell at me there about soft boys being soft. That's fun, too.

Steve finishes the final mission briefing for the team and sits down in the back of the Quinjet. They have about 20 minutes before they reach the mission site, and Steve wants to sit in silence and go through everything one more time in his head to make sure he hasn’t missed anything.

It’s his first mission back after taking a leave of absence after the whole Ultron thing, when Bucky had found him while he was running one day and asked to come back to the Tower with him. He wanted to be there with Bucky for the first few months as he settled in and figured out who he wanted to be post-Hydra, and the rest of the Avengers had readily agreed. It took a little longer for Fury to get on board, but that was tough titties. Steve was gonna take his leave anyway, whether Fury approved or not, which is probably what convinced him in the end. 

Steve was a little nervous, if he was being honest with himself. He knew Bucky would be fine while he was gone, that wasn’t the issue. It’s just...it’s been a little while since he’d had to go out and fight anyone, and he was surprised by how much he enjoyed not having to do it. But the team needs him, and the work is important, so it isn’t  _ bad _ that he was here. It’s just going to take a little time to get back into mission routine, probably. 

He sighs and leans back against his seat, and something in his utility belt pokes him. He frowns, trying to remember what exactly he has in there that could poke him like that. When the answer he comes up with is nothing, he shifts a little more and carefully opens his belt pouch in case it had somehow been tampered with. Not that there was much chance of that — the Tower’s security is impeccable. Still. Just in case. 

He frowns as he looks down at the pouch: it’s a little dim in the back of the Quinjet, and he can’t make out what’s inside. Cautiously, he reaches into the pouch and feels...metal. Smooth, sharp metal. What the shit?

Steve grasps the object gently and pulls it out to find...a throwing knife. Definitely what the shit? Steve didn’t put a throwing knife in his utility belt, so who did? He rummages around in the pouch to see if anything else is in there, but there’s nothing. It’s the fourth pouch from the front, so maybe there’s a clue in another pouch around it. He opens the pouch next to it, the third from the front, and there’s another throwing knife. Huh. There’s yet another throwing knife in the second pouch, a fourth knife in the first pouch. This one, at least, has a note attached to it.

“Because your dumb ass only goes into battle with a glorified frisbee” -B, the note reads. Steve melts into his seat a little bit and feels a goofy smile spread across his face.

“I almost hesitate to ask, but what put that dopey grin on your face?” Sam asks as he walks back toward Steve, Natasha at his back.

Steve holds up his handful of throwing knives. “Bucky put some knives in my belt pouches for me.”

“Aww!” Natasha coos as Clint calls out from the Quinjet’s cockpit, “what kind of knives? Did he leave you a note?”

“Uhh…” Steve says as Natasha takes a knife out of Steve’s hand. “They’re short, Clint, short enough to fit in Steve’s belt pouches, but he can still throw them hard enough to do some damage. Nicely balanced, slightly handle heavy. Good quality.”

“Well, yeah,” Steve says, crossing his arms. “He’s not gonna let me go on a mission with shitty knives.”

Natasha points the knife at him. “True,” she says, flipping it over so she can hand it back handle first.

“What about the note, Steve?!? Don’t think I missed you avoiding that question,” Clint reiterates.

“Oh. Right. It says, ‘because your dumb ass only goes into battle with a glorified frisbee’ -B,” Steve tells them.

“Aww!” they coo at Steve, with Sam adding a “that’s cute as fuck” at the end. 

“Yeah, yeah,” Steve gripes around a smile, rolling his eyes at his teammates but loving the warmth that blooms in his chest at their reaction. “Don’t you all have anything better to do than live vicariously through me and my boyfriend?”

“Not for another ten minutes we don’t,” Natasha says with a smirk. 

~~~

It doesn’t happen often, but every now and then, Bucky goes out on a mission when Steve isn’t needed. It’s almost always because Clint got himself hurt somehow and the team needs a sniper and/or someone better at covert work than Steve. Which isn’t hard, really, since covert work isn’t exactly Steve’s forte. Stealth he can do, as he proved one memorable training day when Fury set up a Steve vs a Strike team challenge where Steve had to infiltrate a secure location and remove a thumb drive without getting caught. He was in and out before anyone even realized he was in the building. Bucky knew he could do it — you don’t run that many successful wartime missions without learning how to stealthily infiltrate a secure location. It was totally worth the shocked looks on everyone’s faces when Steve showed up in the scenario control room undetected, thumb drive in hand, and snarked, “mission accomplished.” 

Anyway, stealth Steve can do, but covert, undercover ops where he has to pretend to be someone he’s not? Nope. Which is why Bucky’s been called in this time. Stark has a bionic sleeve that covers his metal arm and makes it look like a flesh and blood arm, and as long as no one gets too close and touches it, he’s fine. 

He’s sitting in a coffee shop across the street from a laundromat that’s definitely not just a laundromat, sipping at iced coffee number three for the day, waiting for their target to come out of the building. He sighs and puts his coffee down, wiping at his jeans to dry off the condensation from his coffee when he hears a rustle from his pants pocket. He frowns and pokes at his pocket. Huh. There’s definitely something paper in there. Except he knows for a fact that he didn’t actually put anything in his pocket.

He reaches in to see what the heck is going on and pulls out a folded piece of sketch paper from one of Steve’s books. There’s a little cartoon drawing of Bucky as James Bond, wearing a tux and shooting a gun in that iconic Bond pose. Bucky huffs out a laugh. Natasha, Sam, and Clint had come over a couple of nights before Bucky left for this mission, and they’d watched a Bond movie and made fun of the terrible spycraft. Bucky as Bond, though, is shooting little hearts out of his gun. At the top, Steve’s written in fancy movie-poster lettering, “No, Mr. Bond, I Expect You To Die” except he’s crossed out “Die” and added “Come Home and Kiss Me.”

Fuck, that’s incredibly cute. Bucky smiles softly and gently traces his fingers over the drawing, careful not to smudge the pencil. He’s so engrossed that he almost misses the target exiting the laundromat and blows the whole mission. Almost.

~~~

Tony usually likes to fly ahead in his suit, but they need a stealthier approach for this mission, so he’s in the Quinjet with the rest of them. He’s been pacing for the last ten minutes, and it’s starting to give Steve a headache. It’s all hands on deck for this one, so Bucky’s here, too. It’s not the first time that’s happened, that he and Bucky have gone on a mission together, but it never fails to make him feel just a little more jittery than usual. 

“Tony,” Steve says after minute fifteen of pacing. “Are you okay over there? You’ve been pacing a while.”

Tony whips his head around to find Steve, Bucky seated to his right. “Sure, Cap, I’m fine. Good, even. I just...like being out there more than I like being in here. Little tight.”

Bucky frowns at him. “You’re claustrophobic? How does that work with the suit? Isn’t that worse?”

Tony huffs. “I’m not actually claustrophobic, I just don’t like…” he looks at Steve then Bucky then back to Steve again. “Are you two holding hands?”

Steve looks down to where he and Bucky are, in fact, holding hands. “Uh, yeah?”

Tony looks over at Natasha, a knowing smile on her face. “Do they always do that?”

“Yeah.”

Tony looks back at Steve and Bucky’s clasped hands. “Fuck, that’s cute. Don’t you think it’s incredibly adorable when old couples hold hands still, even though they’ve been together for like a million years? I’m gonna tell Pepper when we get back, she’ll love this. Actually no, I’m gonna text her right now.” Tony takes out his phone and snaps a photo of Steve and Bucky’s clasped hands before sitting down in one of the Quinjet’s jump seats, tapping away at his phone.

Bucky looks over at Steve with his eyebrows raised, but Steve just shrugs and squeezes Bucky’s hand tighter. Whatever gets Tony to stop pacing.


End file.
